Letter: Words signify

To the editor:

A lead story on the front page must be news. By definition, it is news. The purpose of news is to inform, inform the public so the public can decide public issues. The story must therefore be sufficiently informative to enable the public to make choices.

The lead story in Journal-World on Nov. 21 concerned the suspension and investigation of an assistant professor for using the “n—–” word. Is she racist? Did she act inappropriately? Or was she attempting to teach to the real world using real world terms and, for doing so, has become the victim of a political correctness that has been judged by many to stifle both thought and speech?

We have been polarized, prepared to line up on either side of a pre-determined debate. Left, right — March!

Words are meant to signify. Some signify ugliness and some beauty, but we need all of them. If we don’t know the words, we cannot write the story. If we know the words then all we need are the freedom and the courage to use them.

But here we don’t know what happened and are left to read between the lines. Was the incident isolated, or part of a pattern of conduct? What did she say, and in what context? If she was wrong, was it malicious or merely inartful? Should she be applauded for bringing real world issues into the classroom, criticized for bad teaching methods or shunned as a racist? We simply don’t know.